- Joined
- Jun 3, 2009
Generally, I'm gonna say there's a difference between skating a competition in a totalitarian country and skating at a festival for a dictator.
Shoot! I am having another senior moment. Wasnt there a worlds or Olympics where some nations were thinking of pulling due to political reasons?
I think the politics should be separated from the issue of the decision of the skaters.
Boy were there ever! In 1980, the Olympics were held in Moscow. This was at the height of the Cold War (and nearer the end than anybody thought at the time). The US led a massive international boycott of the Moscow games.
True.Well, look who's talking.
Ironical in view of later events, the reason for the boycott was that Russia had sent troops to Afghanistan the year before.
I agree. I didnt want to mean that, it is not the same yes. In the first post I wrote I said I wouldnt probably go, but I m not a skater, and me as seniorita I m not doing anything to make N.Korean people feel better about their dictator, so I dont like judging other people's action from my couch.Generally, I'm gonna say there's a difference between skating a competition in a totalitarian country and skating at a festival for a dictator.
Here is one that I didn’t know about. In the 1936 games in Berlin the United States pulled the only two Jewish athletes from the team on the day of their race. I guess the USOC didn’t want to offend Hitler.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olympic_Games_scandals_and_controversies
Good one.....wonder how much offending Jesse Owens did to the master race? It is interesting that African Americans and folks of Jewish faith weren't exactly held in high reguard in the US in 1936, either.
Extra points....what lady figure skater was accused of being a Nazi sympathizer?
According to wikipedia, Sonja Henie even did a Nazi salute to Hitler :
As for Lepisto's part in it, she gets a pass from me, because as I said before, I don't expect anyone that young or that removed from current affairs to have everything figured out.
That is such a generalization. Quite a lot of skaters have interests and activities beyond skating, and many pursue academic studies parallel to their careers. We know very little about most skaters' lives outside the sport - mostly what's revealed in interviews and media profiles. Some skaters may have few interests outside the rink; others are intelligent, educated and knowledgeable about global event - and many probably fall somewhere in between. It may well be that the participating skaters consider these shows an opportunity to travel to a country that's not easy to visit and have as much interaction with its citizens as possible.I don't think I was as ignorant as Lepisto when I was 23. It's good to be an elite figure skater, huh? Those elite skaters seem to live in a parallel world in which only figure skating matters, and all they care about is competitions and training. They travel all over the world, but they only see hotels, arenas and some tourist spots. Maybe they don't watch news. Those European skaters may be more aware of what's going on in Europe just because they live there, but practically have no interest in outside of it. I wouldn't be surprised if they are clueless about what's happening in Syria.
It may well be that the participating skaters consider these shows an opportunity to travel to a country that's not easy to visit and have as much interaction with its citizens as possible.
I'm not sure why skaters' knowledge (or lack thereof) regarding the events in Syria are relevant to this discussion.
Considering we still haven't heard from Laura directly, I'm not going to guess what her views and understanding of the situation in NK might be.
If you're going to shame the skaters, please be fair about it and don't exempt people who are actually current competitors like Pechalat/Bourzat and ... I still would like to know if it's Mae-Berenice I saw, or possibly even Surya? It didn't look like Yretha.And now that I've posted twice here, I might as well say what I think about it: I find it unconscionable to take a heap of money from a man known for profligate spending on his own luxuries (one of which is the services provided for this payment) while his people endure mass starvation. Trying to dress this up as some remote, diplomatic, international and symbolic gesture just depersonalizes the real atrocity here. If it were a man known for buying himself expensive things while his children starve, a merchant who knows this but still tries to sell him jewelry would be scum. In the case of North Korea's Supreme Leader, if all the dealers, black market and otherwise, stopped indulging his expensive tastes, he would exploited his people less. Laura Lepisto, Tomas Verner, Shen/Zhao and Champions on Ice itself are all dealers. Shame on them all.